Creative Chemistry: Descriptive of Recent Achievements in the Chemical IndustriesSlosson, Edwin E. (Edwin Emery)
Science
Creative Chemistry: Descriptive of Recent Achievements in the Chemical Industries
Slosson, Edwin E. (Edwin Emery)
Chemistry, Technical
But many sweet flowers do not readily yield an essential oil, so in such
oases we have to rely altogether upon more or less successful
substitutes. For instance, the perfumes sold under the names of
"heliotrope," "lily of the valley," "lilac," "cyclamen," "honeysuckle,"
"sweet pea," "arbutus," "mayflower" and "magnolia" are not produced from
these flowers but are simply imitations made from other essences,
synthetic or natural. Among the "thousand flowers" that contribute to
the "Eau de Mille Fleurs" are the civet cat, the musk deer and the sperm
whale. Some of the published formulas for "Jockey Club" call for civet
or ambergris and those of "Lavender Water" for musk and civet. The less
said about the origin of these three animal perfumes the better.
Fortunately they are becoming too expensive to use and are being
displaced by synthetic products more agreeable to a refined imagination.
The musk deer may now be saved from extinction since we can make
tri-nitro-butyl-xylene from coal tar. This synthetic musk passes muster
to human nostrils, but a cat will turn up her nose at it. The synthetic
musk is not only much cheaper than the natural, but a dozen times as
strong, or let us say, goes a dozen times as far, for nobody wants it
any stronger.
Such powerful scents as these are only pleasant when highly diluted, yet
they are, as we have seen, essential ingredients of the finest perfumes.
For instance, the natural oil of jasmine and other flowers contain
traces of indols and skatols which have most disgusting odors. Though
our olfactory organs cannot detect their presence yet we perceive their
absence so they have to be put into the artificial perfume. Just so a
brief but violent discord in a piece of music or a glaring color
contrast in a painting may be necessary to the harmony of the whole.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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